


Tantalus

by Steals_Thyme (Liodain)



Category: Watchmen - All Media Types
Genre: Community: kink_bingo, Identity Porn, M/M, Roughhousing, Teasing, UST
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-22
Updated: 2010-06-22
Packaged: 2017-10-10 11:48:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/99444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liodain/pseuds/Steals_Thyme
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dan talks too much.  Rorschach doesn't talk enough.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tantalus

**Author's Note:**

> For [](http://kink-bingo.dreamwidth.org/profile)[**kink_bingo**](http://kink-bingo.dreamwidth.org/) – prompt is 'teasing'. Obligatory identity kink and denial, yadda yadda.

"Welterweight, right?"

Rorschach ignores Nite Owl and tugs a length of nylon rope out of his trench pocket. The felon curled at his feet groans and stirs, so he drives his boot into his ribs until he is still again.

"Rorschach."

Under the mask, Rorschach closes his eyes and counts to five. It's been almost half a year since they aligned themselves into what has become a partnership. It had been going well—it's _still_ going well; he can grudgingly admit that they make a formidable team—but in the past few weeks, he has learned more about Nite Owl than he is entirely comfortable with. He has been dropping details of his civilian life like breadcrumbs and Rorschach can't help but follow them, piecing together a profile of the man beneath the uniform as he goes.

Early twenties, independently wealthy, educated at Harvard. Likes birds and aeronautics and foreign takeout. Poor eyesight. Irritatingly loquacious. Excessively kind. Regrettably liberal. For all intents, they are polar opposites.

(And what is it they say about opposites?)

But that's not the worst part. The worst part is the assumption that since he shares so much, it's okay for him to attempt to pry personal details out of Rorschach. Last time it was his accent ("You sound like you're from Jersey when you get mad."), before that, his eating habits ("Sweet tooth, huh?"), and now _this_—

He yanks the unconscious thug around until he's sitting slumped with his chin on his chest, and lashes him to a lamp post. He glares up at Nite Owl. "Call it in," he says.

"You are a boxer, though?" Nite Owl says, unclipping the radio from his belt. He tweaks at the settings, but Rorschach knows he's deliberately tarrying until he gets an answer.

Rorschach gives a rough sigh. Dawn is leaking into the sky and he is tired, worn down by the night's violence and this constant, exhausting camaraderie. "Never competed," he says, and immediately regrets it.

"I knew it." An exultant grin spreads across Nite Owl's face, and Rorschach resigns himself to a long flight back, filled with endless questions.

  
–  


 

"So, was I right?" Nite Owl pulls the thrust lever, and the Archimedes glides through dirty gray cloud banks. Below them, New York's lights gutter out as the sun brightens the horizon. "Welterweight?"

"Like I said," Rorschach says. "Didn't compete."

"You never weighed in, even once?" Nite Owl has pulled his goggles down around his neck; something that makes Rorschach acutely uncomfortable. He doesn't like the way his eyes soften when he smiles—and he's smiling now. "I don't believe you."

Rorschach folds his arms and scowls. His mask must have presented some appropriately discouraging imagery, as Nite Owl gives a diffident shrug and returns his attention to the controls. It's not long before they're jetting through the subway tunnel, engines whining as the owlship sets down in the Nest.

"Coffee?" Nite Owl offers, paused halfway out of the hatch. This is a ritual that is already far too familiar; superseding Nite Owl's nightly insistence that Rorschach come see his lair, once that battle was won.

"No," he says, as always. "Thank you."

And here's where Nite Owl will nod and raise a hand in farewell as Rorschach leaves. Here is where the boundaries are delineated cleanly; no overlap of daytime affairs and private identities to muddy their partnership.

Except this morning, instead of saying, "See ya, buddy," Nite Owl tugs off his gauntlets and says, "Can I tempt you with a beer, then?"

"It's almost six a.m.," Rorschach says, taken aback despite himself. This is a new tactic. "Little early to start drinking, Nite Owl."

Nite Owl laughs, a rich sound that reverberates around the basement and makes the hair on Rorschach's arms stand on end. The man in Nite Owl's clothing is becoming more apparent, wearing through the persona as the night dwindles.

"I'm not proposing that we go on a bender," Nite Owl says, and the corners of his eyes are crinkled, shining with humor that Rorschach doesn't get. "Just one bottle." He licks his lips and after a pause, carefully adds: "Or are you a lightweight?"

Rorschach tilts his head fractionally. A joke to be sure, just gentle ribbing in the same vein as his other observations. He would commend his partner on how neatly he'd set it up—it's the kind of long game he can appreciate—but Nite Owl is laughing and Rorschach's throat is suddenly tight.

And it's his first match, he's fourteen years old with blood on his chin and a tooth rocking loose under his tongue. The other boy is unlacing his gloves and laughing, laughing and saying, too easy, you scrawny little bastard.

_little shit_

And it's his first day at work, he has to shuffle his chair forward to reach the sewing machine's peddle and the girl to his left is trying and failing to smother her giggles.

_filthy little animal_

And it's his first night wearing the mask, the punk kid has turned his back on him and is laughing with his friend, laughing, and Rorschach has raised his fists and—

"_Whoa_ there. Hey—"

Nite Owl has his hands up in defense and now he's not laughing. Rorschach can feel the ghost of the impact in his forearm and wrist.

"I didn't mean anything by it." Nite Owl takes his upper arm with one hand, and he's working the other under the crown of his cowl, pushing it back. His face is unbearably earnest, forehead creased in concern. "Sorry, man. It was meant to be a joke."

Rorschach discovered Nite Owl's real name several weeks ago. He didn't need to know the face that accompanied it, did not need to know that Daniel Dreiberg is as mild and pleasant as he thought he would be. The polar opposite of tired, rough Kovacs.

(And they say that opposites—)

He feels like he's been drenched in ice water; his skin shivers and raises in goosebumps. "Idiot," he hisses, and shoves himself away with a fist to the man's shoulder. "What are you doing."

Nite Owl shrugs his hand away. "I just thought—"

"No, you didn't." His knuckles are against Nite Owl's collarbone, pushing. "Didn't _think_." Except that's not true. Rorschach knows this is the culmination of a month of slipped hints; wheedling and pressing, teasing him irrevocably closer.

Nite Owl narrows his eyes, suddenly raptorial. He reaches out, places his fingertips on Rorschach's shoulder, and pushes back. A brief nudge, but firm enough to rock Rorschach back on his heels.

It's juvenile baiting and he knows it—_both_ of them know it—but if there's anything they have in common, it's the reluctance to back down from a challenge, a stubborn streak a mile wide.

Rorschach squares his shoulders. Nite Owl raises his chin.

He means to push again, but his hand is deflected and then they are moving. Rorschach weaves and throws deliberately telegraphed jabs. Nite Owl catches them against his palms in an easy rhythm, and it's a touch sharper, a touch fiercer, but enough like any other time they've sparred.

Which makes it almost too easy for Rorschach to feint, dart under Nite Owl's guard and knee him in the groin. Revenge, unannounced and swiftly dealt: that's for laughing. Nite Owl's surprised huff is satisfying, but when it transmutes into a breathless chuckle, it makes Rorschach's gut churn.

"Oh, man." Nite Owl says, voice tight with pain or mirth, or both. He drops down to one knee and curls over himself. "That? That was below the belt."

It's a span of seconds before Rorschach remembers Nite Owl wears a cup and therefore shouldn't be in as much pain as he appears—but by the time realization sets in, he's caught Nite Owl's shoulder in his stomach and is flat on his back, air driven out of his lungs by the takedown. He can see his fedora out of the corner of his eye, settling upside-down on the concrete floor.

"New rules," Nite Owl declares, straddling Rorschach's hips, and it's just a grapple hold, he's just controlling his opponent with a pin (it's called _mounting_, his brain suggests helpfully). "I can make them, too."

"Been changing them all along," Rorschach mutters, attempting to twist out of the hold. Nite Owl is heavy in full costume, makes things more difficult than they should be. Rorschach grabs his shoulders, tries to turn this tactical disadvantage into something that will work in his favor.

Nite Owl plucks his hands away by the wrists, and pins them over his head. The maneuver brings them nose to nose, so close that Nite Owl's—Daniel's, this is Daniel, now—hair brushes against his mask. He's staring down at him, and his expression should be teasing or self-satisfied or even arrogant, but it's not.

Rorschach's thighs tense and he bucks upward before he can understand the impulse, rising against the sturdy weight of his partner. It rocks Daniel forward, enough that it could have been an attempt to dislodge him.

Because that is what it was.

Daniel releases Rorschach's wrists to balance himself, palms flat to the basement floor either side of his head, and settles back. He's watching intently, pupils blown and tracking minutely back and forth. It looks like he's watching the ebb and swell of ink, but something in the set of his mouth makes this dangerous, makes Rorschach wary. He curls his hands around Daniel's biceps and meets no resistance. He could turn him with the strength in his shoulders and leave him open, sprawled on his back. But instead, he says, "Hehn. Let me up."

And then Daniel's face is animated again, mouth widening into a grin. He shifts his weight onto one hand and Rorschach thinks for once he's going to acquiesce without a fuss, but then he feels warm, bare fingers tuck under his scarf, against his neck.

Rorschach tenses, guttering out a harsh breath. He clamps a hand around Daniel's wrist.

"I won't," Daniel murmurs. "I promise."

He's so intent, so sincere in his curiosity, and Rorschach should hate it. He should resent all of this, the persistent erasing and redrawing of boundaries, and he knows if he gives Daniel an inch, he might take—

Daniel's fingers move, tracing along the taut muscles of Rorschach's neck, stretching the latex of his mask over his knuckles as he goes. His fingertips rasp over the stubble on his throat and settle on his escalating pulse.

Rorschach swallows. Daniel's fingertips ride the flex of muscle, and slip upward to press against the hard corner of his jaw.

"I wonder," Daniel says, _sotto voce_, as though he isn't sure whether he's talking to Rorschach or to himself. "About you. You're always so—" His fingertips travel to graze the dip beneath Rorschach's lower lip. "Do you know that you...?"

Rorschach is silent, focused on keeping his breathing even, since that's become difficult—Daniel's weight on him being the most obvious cause. He reins in the desire to brace his shoulders against the concrete and arch his back.

"I thought if I showed you parts of me, that you would... but you didn't. You don't." There's a quality to his voice that Rorschach can't interpret. It makes him want to flip him over, push him face down onto the basement floor. "Always just out of reach," he says.

His fingers withdraw, tracing the contour of Rorschach's chin, against the soft underside and down his neck, over the knot of his Adam's apple. He fixes Rorschach's scarf, and it's suddenly far too hot under the latex of the mask. It feels like his breath is condensing like it would on cold glass.

Daniel pushes up and away, to his knees and then to his feet.

Rorschach tries to take a slow, deep breath, and finds it hasn't gotten any easier. He hitches himself up on his elbows, tips his head up to watch his partner. Tall, broad, healthily-built. Polar opposite.

(And it would be easy to believe they could exist in a state of complementarity.)

Daniel offers him a hand up. He could take advantage of the opening, uses Daniel's weight and balance against him; it's a technique he quickly mastered when he often found himself dealing with opponents larger than he.

He could sit astride him, tease the air from his chest—because even a lightweight can be heavy, under enough pressure.

Could peel the latex from his own face, millimeters at a time, though never quite enough to satisfy. Never so much that Daniel would see how different they are.

Just enough to keep him wondering.


End file.
